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Self-Immolator Matt Nelson Reportedly Alive (husseini.substack.com)

submitted 1 month ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 month ago

In Matt Nelson's words:

"My name is Matt Nelson and I'm about to engage in an extreme act of protest," he said in a video first uploaded to YouTube on Wednesday. "We are all culpable in the ongoing genocide in Gaza."

"We are slaves to capitalism and the military-industrial complex. Most of us are too apathetic to care," Nelson continued. "The protest I'm about to engage in is a call to our government to stop supplying Israel with the money and weapons it uses to imprison and murder innocent Palestinians, to pressure Israel to end the genocide in Gaza, and to support the [International Criminal Court] indictment of [Israeli Prime Minister] Benjamin Netanyahu and other members of the Israeli government."

"A democracy is supposed to serve the will of the people, not the interests of the wealthy," he added. "Take the power back. Free Palestine."

'We Are All Culpable': Matt Nelson Self-Immolates to Protest Israel's Gaza Onslaught

[–] [email protected] 32 points 1 month ago (4 children)

If he makes it, he is going to be infinitely full of regret with the consequences he'll have to live with.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

You think he will not just try to commit suicide again?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

I have read that statistically people tend not to. Don't know the truth of it. He'll still be suffering in the meantime.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

People very rarely survive significant burns. I know the article says 50/50, but he is essentially dead. The infection risk is just too high.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 month ago (2 children)

I think what will hurt worse is that the genocide is still talking place and his sacrifice didn't move the needle as much as he would have expected.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 month ago

Every sacrafice slowly moves the public opinion needle. There is never a single instance people can point to that instantly changed everyone's mind.

That said, after Aaron Bushnell I doubt self immolation is going to make much of an impact anymore. Direct action such as blocking highways and israeli arms factories are much more effective now.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I don't think you can presume to know what he expected when he hasn't said what he expected, or to know the effect it's had within a handful of days.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

Please. I've already seen ghoulish, unprincipled crackers talking about "the world is tired of martyrs" on this very site. Not one singular settler scumbag is going to change their ways over this. We need to stop immolating ourselves and start burning the real problems.

[–] [email protected] 41 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Why would you think that people who have the courage to act on their principles would regret it?

The amount of self determination it must take to smell the gasoline and still strike the match makes me think that the people who do this are capable of living with the consequences of their actions.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago (2 children)

I think you might not know very much about the pain of third degree burns.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago

Third degree burns don't hurt because the burns destroyed the nerves. Source: Had 3rd degree burns. The skin graft hurt more.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I don't think it's realistic to assume you understand the mental state of someone who's already proved they are capable of setting themselves on fire to make a point.

[+] [email protected] -14 points 1 month ago (1 children)

They were suicidal, and now they're trapped.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago (1 children)

They were suicidal

I've not heard any reporting say this. I've seen internet commenters presume this, but just because someone engaged in an action that could result in their death, doesn't mean they're suicidal.

[+] [email protected] -10 points 1 month ago (4 children)

Starting ones self on fire is a suicide attempt, regardless of political motive. This isn't the same as sky diving or even trying to see the Titanic in a carbon fiber pod, this is pure and simple, self immolation to death that failed, so far.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

You don’t have to be suicidal to jump on a grenade

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago

There is a substantial difference between "being suicidal" in the clinical sense and having decided to commit suicide. We have no reason to believe, lacking an avenue for the "self expression" of immolation, that he would have jumped from a bridge or hung himself in the attic. As far as we can tell, he looked at the present political situation and judged that the most effective thing he could do to accomplish what he believed had to be accomplished was by doing something that required the investment of dying. That's not the same thing as "being suicidal", though you and I both disagree with his choice for our respective reasons.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Starting ones self on fire is a suicide attempt, regardless of political motive.

Is being a soldier assigned to conduct an assault operation also a suicide attempt?

Knowingly doing something that might kill you is not the sole criteria for a suicide attempt. If they weren't suicidal it wasn't a suicide attempt.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Suicide: the act or an instance of taking one's own life voluntarily and intentionally

~Merriam-Webster Dictionary

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

You shouldn't try to answer clinical questions with Merriam-Webster. It's a very redditor thing to do and just as incorrect as that would suggest.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Lol. I'm a therapist, and you're being pedantic. Suicide means killing yourself. He may not have been clinically "suicidal" but he still attempted suicide

Edit: I thought you were the original commenter when I said you were being pedantic

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I agree, but Merriam-Webster remains a bad way to try to squash claims of nuance. You are correct independent of the bad and redditor-esque method of argument you chose. You should know very well that texts with actual authority exist that better establish these things, like the DSM in this case.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago

The DSM is great for billing insurance and not much else imo

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Doing something that will almost assuredly kill you is a suicide attempt.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

Trying to take your own life out of depression and being willing to give your life to a cause differ in intent, goals, context and likely methods.

What benefits do you see from classifying them as the same thing? They seem very different to me.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 month ago

You are technically correct, which I hear is the best kind. Equating this individuals self-immolation to draw attention to and emphasize the situation in Gaza to someone who is struggling with mental health is disingenuous.

[–] [email protected] 56 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I think someone who has the self determination to go ahead with this expects to not survive. Doing it and unexpectedly surviving and having to live a likely painful rest of your life is different.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

That just means he can do it again.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago

With severe burns, that won’t be true for likely several years, maybe never.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I support Palestine, but self harm isn't the answer. Protesting in this way doesn't help anyone.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Then what way will, settler? Should we just start drilling down collaborators in the streets? Turn the whole country into O-Block?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago

End the myth of the nation-state